


The Fury

by Nekositting



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 2018 Tomione Valentine's Smut Fest, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Muggle, Blood, Dark, Dark Nymphs, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, I am messing heavily with consent, Magical Contracts, Mind Manipulation, Mind Meld, Psychological Horror, Rape/Non-con Elements, Suspense, porn with slight plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-18 10:12:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13679622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nekositting/pseuds/Nekositting
Summary: "I didn’t agree to this, to you. I came back, just as the bloody magic bid me to. There was nothing in the terms about me being yours.” She spat the word as if it was the most vile thing she’d ever said, incensed when the creature had the audacity to laugh at her, wading through the greenery with a patience she didn’t have. Graceful and silent, like a hunter prepared to strike once it’s prey lowered its guard.“You should have known better than to make deals with things you did not understand...Hermione.”





	The Fury

**Author's Note:**

> This story is fucked up. Take my word for it.
> 
> I don't do things by halves. Read at your own risk. This is for the 2018 Tomione Valentine’s Lemonade Smut Fest. Based on the image below.
> 
> Note, it’s been a long while since I’ve written smut for this ship. Might be a bit rusty.
> 
> Leave comments if you enjoyed.

* * *

 

From the very first moment she’d seen the beautiful verdant forest, she knew she was lost. It was the most breathtaking place she’d ever seen—the kind of place that lodged itself in one’s memory and refused to let go.  
  
It was like laughter that refused to die down, the tremble of one’s lip when caught in a frigid storm.  
  
It’d been entirely unexpected. Perhaps, it was that surprise that had left such an impression on her—unprepared for the sight that revealed itself to her when she was most distraught and harried.  
  
_People were dying._  
  
She hadn’t had time to appreciate where she was going, to make sense of this maze of green when villagers were falling like flies left and right. She’d been searching for herbs for hours, meticulously gathering the necessary ingredients for salves her patients needed for treatment.  
  
There was an illness devouring the village—stealing lives in a manner of hours rather than the days typically common for untreated sickness. It was a blight, an unknown that even she struggled to decipher. It frankly hadn’t mattered at the time _where_ it was that she was going—no, none of that had been important. Had barely registered to her brain when this had been life or death.

_People were dying._

She hadn’t _known_ why this was so. The illness had come from nothing, but there hadn’t been _time_ to waste thinking of the whys. No, not when Ron himself had fallen ill not too long ago as well...  
  
So she had done what she did best, what she’d been trained to do in all her clinicals back in America, what she’d learned after spending months in the small village treating patients for mild illnesses.  She’d delved into the forest behind her home, treating the natural world like it was the village’s salvation— _his salvation_ —where she would find the necessary tools to rescue them all from the cruel hands of death.  
  
But she hadn’t found them. At least, not at first.  
  
She’d searched, and searched, and _searched_ . And recovered absolutely nothing.  
  
She hadn’t known how long she had spent trekking through ankle-deep mud, how many scares she’d experienced with predatory animals lurking behind wide trees trunks. It could have easily been minutes or hours—it’d been too difficult to tell just how much time had passed. She had ripped through the forest with a desperation she hadn’t known she was capable of, and it was only fair that she’d lose sight of when the search started and when her limbs screamed for her to stop.  
  
Frustration, a familiar burn that followed her throughout the excursion, had only grown worse,  more explosive the longer she remained empty-handed. It had been like grabbing water, the liquid trickling through each indent of her hands, refusing to be caught.  
  
But then, just as she’d lost hope, tears burning at the corner of her eyes from the helplessness and grief, from the knowledge that she had _failed_ , that she had indirectly _killed_ everyone with her incompetence, she’d stumbled onto this unknown place entirely on accident.  
  
She had, after months of living near a forest she thought she knew everything about, found something _new_ . An answer, a gift, a source of magic that’d robbed her completely of speech.  
  
It was a waterfall, one tucked away behind the dense thicket of trees. Its rushing waters sparkling, quaking with a power she tried to make sense of because—  
  
_Where had this waterfall come from?_

There’d been no tell tale sound of rapid waters pulsing furiously with energy. She hadn’t seen the river flowing to some unknown part in the thicket of trees, its waters gleaming brightly beneath the hot sun. She’d been searching for hours, snipping herbs, digging calloused hands into mud, but this _waterfall_ —  
  
She hadn’t heard it. It shouldn’t have been there at all, but even when its presence defied all logic, her mind screaming for her to see _sense_ , she didn’t hesitate.  
  
She’d stepped closer, jaw hanging loosely in awe.  
  
It was as if someone had summoned the beautiful waterfall, had cast a powerful spell to bend the forest around her to her will. An answer to her silent cries—one that Hermione had never felt more grateful for.  
  
Vines and plants grew in abundance there. There were herbs of all kinds, some she recognized immediately and others she’d never seen before.  It was a healer’s paradise—a doctor’s playground.  
  
It might not have been anything Hermione was used to, having resided in America for most of her medical career, but it’d been something. It was the nearest thing to a pharmacy she could get considering she now lived in a poor village in the middle of South America. Her supplies emptied out after using up all her stores to treat a sickness that refused fade.  
  
There were simply no doctors here, the town lost to poverty and to the caprices of a people that refused to bend to the will of the surrounding countries. A tribe that held steadfast  to their beliefs and cultural traditions. An unwillingness to bring innovation to their homes, afraid of what it could mean.

She had understood this fear. History reflected just how cruel innovation could be, and so, when the details were shared among her unit, even when everyone else had balked at the prospect of going into the middle of nowhere, she didn’t hesitate to lend her aid.

The hospital had been unwilling to let her go, but Hermione Granger refused to be cowed into submission. There were capable doctors in America, educated men and women that could give a helping hand to the people. The same could not be said for those in impoverished third-world countries. The allure of public service had simply been too strong to resist.

Hermione did not regret her choice. No, this had been the single best decision of her life. To turn her back on them when the offer had been extended to her would have been unacceptable. She had already become a champion for this task. She could not and would not abandon them.

None of her team would. This was a mission only they could accomplish, after all. Only they were _willing_ to see it through. Others had been offered this opportunity, but they all had rejected it while she had _fought_ to leave.

So it was unthinkable that she would not take the opportunity this new hidden location could provide. She refused not to seize this for the boon that it was.

To say no would be to deny these people provisions, basic human needs that all her patient’s in America had. These people were helpless, were _dying_ from a lack of competent medical care. They had nothing but the animals they hunted, the surrounding fauna, and mystical wisdom. None of which could save them from sickness, that could provide them with adequate food and drink.  
  
It was a calling, an _honor_ to do what she was doing now. So it didn’t matter that she’d been suffering. It didn’t matter that she was a long way from home. She would see it through because no other _would_ , no other had the will to throw themselves into danger for the sake of saving lives. She’d do whatever it took to help them, and if that meant taking on more than she was able, if that meant desecrating this ethereal place to collect what she needed for the villagers, she’d do it.  
  
It hadn’t mattered at the time that it physically pained her to tear off the heads and stems from some of these beautiful plants. Aesthetics and nature were _secondary_ to human life.  
  
Hermione, for the first, and perhaps the last, time in her life had acted before thinking. She’d torn into the clearing with a madness more synonymous to that of a wild animal than a woman.

There’d been no regret. No, she had known what her choice would be before she truly pondered on the consequences of her actions.

This had been _her_ burden to bear, her sacrifice for the lives of others—for _Ron_.

And now—

What she had intended to be a single visit, a single push to help those in need, had become more. Hoping that her second, fourth, tenth visit would be her last.

How silly she had been to think that that would be the case.

Hermione continued to return to the waterfall, long after the cure had been found and everyone saved. Drawn in by some unexplainable force that urged her— _practically demanded_ —that she go back, even when she didn’t want to.

Its call was unyielding, suffocating and enthralling. She’d thought she could resist it, at first. Believed that with enough medicine, that with enough grit, she could will away the burning ache wedged between her ribs urging her to return to the waterfall.

But it hadn’t. It’d only grown worse. The ache bloomed into agony, her compulsion into madness. It was only after a near month of curling into her mattress in agony, that she’d finally given in.

And now, there hadn’t been a day that she didn’t return.

It didn’t matter that her stores were full, practically brimming with different species of plants. She still went. Cursed, somehow, by the lulling rush of water and the bright colors of the flowers that bloomed beside the riverbank.

It was an addiction that she did nothing to resist, knowing well that even if she did struggle against its pull, she would not win. Her duties as a medical practitioner saw to that. The agony that settled low in the pit of her stomach ensured this.

It was a hefty price to pay, but she would do whatever it took. This had been her burden, her sacrifice, for the lives of the villagers. She wouldn’t change a single thing, even if that did mean freedom.

After all, her comfort did not matter. Hermione Granger, above all, was a doctor. If she had the power to rescue them, then she would suffer through whatever was required to see that through. She had given up her life to save lives, and though she barely understood the ramifications of her decision, she wasn’t afraid. She’d raise her chin proudly, as if she were the luckiest girl in the world.

It had been worth it—was _still_ worth it. It was better than the alternative.

The alternative meant separated families. It meant pained smiles. It meant the twisting grimace of Harry Potter’s lips, and never seeing Ron’s sky blue eyes again...

* * *

 

“Mione, are you sure it’s okay for you to be going into the forest so often?” Harry said, eyes narrowed with concern when Hermione began to prepare her basket, dumping jam and other small snacks into it for her break, her mind once again drawn to clear waters and hot stone beneath her feet.  
  
She knew that this was becoming a problem. This...obsession wasn’t healthy. That this ache, a pain that formed low in her belly when she spent too long away, was unnatural.  
  
But frankly, Hermione didn’t have a choice. She hadn’t had one since she’d stumbled into the place—hidden away from both villagers and colleagues alike.  
  
_I don’t want to go back, but I sacrificed my freedom to save everyone from that plague..._ It was unthinkable to tell her friend this. He’d think her mad. Or worse yet, he’d _believe_ her and try to get her out of the mess she’d thrown herself in.  
  
Hermione pointedly ignored Harry’s comment, stomach twisting into knots. She wanted to tell him. She did. Her jaw ached with the need to tell him exactly why she needed to go back, but she simply couldn’t. To tell him such a thing...to open her mouth and drop that sort of mystical knowledge on her friend was unthinkable. He couldn’t know about this, about her sacrifice and the agony that followed when she’d stubbornly tried to resist. The last thing she needed was for Harry to follow after her.  
  
Whatever that magic was, she knew that it wouldn’t take kindly to strangers. It had already claimed her, already accepted her sacrifice, as implicit and unwilling as she’d been. Unless she wanted Harry to get caught in that same web, she needed to keep her tongue in check.  
  
Harry cleared his throat when she didn’t say anything after more than a beat, as if to draw her attention back to his searching gaze.  
  
Hermione decided to weave truth with lies, the skin crawling sensation of his inquisitive gaze making her nervous.  
  
“Why wouldn’t it be? I’m the only one that knows where it is. It isn’t _dangerous_ ,” she groused, stuffing a blanket after she finished packing her meals.  
  
She knew she’d be gone for some time. Each visit seemed to grow longer and longer, far more taxing and demanding than the last.  
  
“It’s just strange. You were never one to be so _attuned_ to nature, ‘Mione,” Harry said, tone suspicious as she began to pack utensils seconds after.  
  
“In fact—“  
  
She wrinkled her nose when she couldn’t find her favorite spoon, and finally returned her attention to Harry’s form. He was slouching on one of the dining chairs, arm resting beneath his chin as he looked at her. When he had sat down and gotten into that position in the seconds she’d glanced away to pack, she didn’t know.  
  
“—you always _hated_ going outside.”  
  
Hermione pursed her lips into a displeased line. Harry was one of the first friends she’d made in her program. He was intelligent, hard-working, and intuitive. He just knew how to handle any emergency, snapping quickly to attention before anyone realized that shit was about to hit the fan.

  
The fact that his attention was now on her, that he was looking at her as if he _knew_ she wasn’t being completely truthful, made her uncomfortable.  
  
“Harry, I get it. But please, could you just cut it out? People _do_ change. You should know this better than anyone.”

Hermione glared at him, daring him to say anything more.

Harry of all people knew better. Others could and did change. He himself had changed immensely since starting the program with her and Ron. He wasn’t the hurt, reticent adult that still needed reassurance that his actions were not _wrong_ when skewered by the cutting words of their supervising nurse.

Harry’s home life before he’d finally escaped that hell hole had been horrid. A nightmare. The sort of stories that one read to their own children to frighten them into sleep. The kind that crippled one’s self-esteem.

No one deserved to be abused. No one deserved to be treated as less.

It was how they’d become fast friends. It certainly hadn’t happened overnight, but it was something that she had worked hard for.

It was low of her to bring that up—to cow him into not speaking more about her change in habits, but it had to be done.

Guilt flashed along Harry’s gaze, and it took everything within her not to apologize and fess up. She hated hurting his feelings. He had the greatest intentions, and all he was doing was looking out for her.

Hermione couldn’t begrudge him that even if it made lying through her teeth challenging.

“...You’re right. I’m sorry, ‘Mione,” Harry said after a moment, cheeks flushing pink with embarrassment.

With a sigh, Hermione dumped the last remaining things into her picnic basket, and snorted. She needed to lighten the mood. Harry was the sort to sulk and agonize over little things for hours if they weren’t rectified.

“Enough of that. If you’re _really_ sorry, why don’t you go grab my first aid kid? You never know what nasties could be out there waiting,” Hermione teased, and Harry relaxed, seemingly pleased that Hermione had taken no offense to his worrying and had decided to move the conversation into a much lighter subject.

“Goodness, ‘Mione. You’re ruthless, taking advantage of my poor old heart,” Harry shot back, and Hermione laughed in response when he pressed his hand dramatically to his chest before heading towards the small bathroom at the other end of the cottage.

Though, that wasn’t much of a walk really. Her place was small. Enough for a single person to live comfortably with perhaps one pet. It wasn’t nearly enough space for two, especially when her bedroom barely fit her desk in the first place.

It was one of the few things she missed from the states. Here, in the middle of South America, there wasn’t much room for any of her comforts. She only had space for the necessities, and she made the best of it.

Whether it was necessary for her to bring her entire collection of books from the states was a whole other matter. To her, it was _unthinkable_ to leave those behind. She had medical texts that could and did prove to be useful there. It would be ludicrous to leave those behind.

Even if Ron and Harry both swore that she didn’t need it with all the knowledge swimming in her brain.

Hermione’s lips twitched into a fond smile before she took hold of the basket.

She headed for the front door, knowing that with how small the place was, Harry would know she was heading out. The floorboards always groaned with the weight of her body, after all. It was as good an alarm as there could be in the middle of nowhere.

“Jeez, you’re in quite the hurry. Couldn’t even wait for me to yell for help in case something sprung out from behind the bathroom cabinet.”

Hermione sighed dramatically, and with her best admonishing voice, turned to him after he came through the open doorway and said, “Please, you’re fully capable of defending yourself. You were a _quarterback_ on the college football team.”

Harry paused, and Hermione narrowed her eyes at him, daring him to deny this fact. It was still surprising how someone so gentile and thin could have played the sport. Then again, when he was in his gear he didn’t look nearly as small as he actually was.

“Fine, I’ll let it slide this once,” Harry said, a pout on his lips before he suddenly grew serious.

His green eyes were hard, glimmering brightly beneath the radiant sun. Hermione stopped herself from tensing immediately in response, already sensing Harry’s intentions.

“Just be sure to take care of yourself out there. The forest, even during the day, can be dangerous,” Harry said after a beat, concern thick in his voice.

Hermione knew he wanted to say more. She could sense it in the way his shoulders shook, how he licked his lip anxiously to stifle the additional words that wanted to come forth.

With a comforting smile, she pressed her free hand on his shoulder and squeezed. She hoped it was reassuring, though she doubted it would be enough to quell Harry’s anxious habits. She’d managed to nip that in the bud earlier, but to suggest it could work a second time on the same day? Unthinkable.

“I’ll be fine, I always carry a knife with me anyway. Now go find Ron, I’m sure there’s plenty to do around town.”

* * *

 

When Hermione caught the familiar sound of rushing waters and rustling trees, she knew she had arrived. It was unmistakable. She would recognize it anywhere.

Her feet crunched against the grass, dry leaves and moist earth caving beneath her weight as she broke through the first thicket of trees. It was always hidden away, as if it purposefully did not want to be found.

But somehow, for some reason, it always knew when to open itself up. As if it could sense her presence before she arrived, luring her back to the space she’d stumbled upon in error, and now, could not leave.

The first thing that came into view was the rushing water of the riverbank, stone and grass peppered across the wide clearing. She stepped through, throat tight with awe even now.

It didn’t matter that Hermione was practically there every single day. Just the sight of the waters reflecting the bright sunlight from above her head and the beautiful flowers that grew beside the waters, was enough to impress. It was different each time she went. A different plant, a different color and shape to the way the leaves curled ‘round the stems of the greenery.

Sometimes they were blues and reds, winding around the riverbank until her head inevitably stared into the chaotic spray of water of the waterfall. It was its own siren, its own curled finger urging her to go, and Hermione never dared disobey the call even when her insides quivered at the thought of complying.

Hermione knew it was wrong. That this compulsion, that the almost breathtaking quality of this hidden niche was strange and bizarre. She knew this all perfectly well, but knowledge did not matter once you’d been ensnared.

She stepped further into the space, basket in hand, toeing her shoes off without a single thought.

Cold rushed up Hermione’s ankles when her feet met the moist earth below, and a sigh escaped her parted lips at the familiarity. It soothed her in the same way a chocolate dessert did after a long day of hard work.

“I’m here,” Hermione said after a moment, eyes briefly fluttering shut when a spray of water began to pepper along her cheeks, droplets gathering along her forehead and exposed arms. It welcomed her with its embrace, dragged her further inside.

Her feet moved without her conscious thought, her mind quieted by the swirls of darkness along her vision and the tantalizing press of water against her heated skin.

_Hermione…_

The air breathed her name, and Hermione moved further and further along the wide space, until the soft and moist press of earth beneath her gave way to hard stone. It bit at her, cut along the indents of her toes and spaces between her feet.

The arch of her feet protested, but Hermione paid the twinge little mind. Not when the sound of splashing water became louder, not when the climb to the waterfall had to be made. It was what the magic demanded, it was what the air chanted over and over in her head.

_Hermione…_

She followed the voice, the comforting embrace of freezing air and wetness like a seductive lilt beckoning for her to come. Unaware of where she was going, her mind engrossed with the promise of peace that’d settled deep into the marrow of her bones.

It was all she recognized in that moment. She wanted it more than she wanted air, than she needed the food tucked away in the basket still caught between her fingers.

_Hermione…_

She climbed, eyes closed as she followed it all the way until even her thoughts were drowned by the sound of rushing water.

_Come to me…_

Hermione went, body undulating now to the silent sound of music blaring in her head. The waterfall, the voice, the beating of her heart, all the rhythm she needed to move to. It drew her, coaxed her, lips twisting into a blissful smile at the way her hair fell away from the ponytail she’d tamed it into.

It had somehow gotten free, the loose end of her curls tickling the nape of her neck, twisting around her shoulder blades, and lower still until it swept up the small of her back…

 _Come to me_ …

The basket swayed in her grip, and Hermione swayed too. She was delirious, suddenly drunk when a rush of something strange bloomed low in her belly. It pooled like the bottom of the riverbank, like the deeper waters of the waterfall where all of liquid percolated.

_You’re so close…_

Hermione’s teeth ached, stomach quivering with desire and need, a sharpened blade cutting up along her spine because she needed to find it _now_. She was desperate for it, fingers loosening on the basked until it slipped from her grip and a loud thud disrupted the echoes of that voice in her head—

Then, everything suddenly stopped.

Her limbs collapsed beneath her, her head swimming with dizziness when she forced her eyes open to make sense of where she was. It was as if she were a doll and her puppet strings had been cut—freed by some capricious entity that was now curious to see how she’d behave, how she’d act now that she had a mind of her own.

It was dark.

The clearing was gone, and all that was there was the sound of echoing droplets in the distance.

There was no light. No waterfall. All that made sense to her in that second was the cold, and the way it nipped against her flesh, wound itself ‘round her body until she was certain she might freeze to death there.

It was an abyss. A black that nothing, short of her own breaths, could shake. It was unsettling, frightening to wake up in a place such as this.

Everything was just...so still. It almost made her wonder if she was dead. If she’d stumbled upon a place that she wasn’t meant to, a pocket in the universe where neither the living nor the dead ought to be. She didn’t recognize it, didn’t know know what to make of it.

She remembered walking into the clearing, parting the leaves and catching sight of the blooms growing by the riverbank—

And then nothing. Only intoxication, a voice urging her to follow with such desperation that she couldn’t resist.

Pain suddenly sparked along her forehead, and Hermione forced her fingers against the skin around her temples, pushing back to ward off the ache. It felt like she’d been punched repeatedly in the face—knocked out by the blows to only wake up to a losing match.

She reached outward to steady herself when her body rocked, suddenly unsteady, but then caught herself before she could eat hard stone. The last thing she needed was a broken tooth of all things. She doubted her parents would ever forgive her if she went back to Britain with missing teeth—

The floor was wet beneath her fingers, and it took everything within her to push herself up, to stop the water from soaking through where her knees had knocked against the floor. It was like winter had hidden itself away from the beautiful greenery of the South American weather. A mind of its own—hungry for the darkness, for the world that would welcome it with open arms.

And now, it welcomed her too. The darkness, the cold, and this strange suffocating feeling that flared to life just as her confusion melted away. Unease replaced the lethargy, arms rippling with gooseflesh because this place wasn’t normal, this place was—

“ _Hermione…_ ”

A scream tore from her throat, and suddenly, she was on her feet.

The voice had come from somewhere behind her in the dark.

It was unmistakable. She’d heard it, the way it enunciated her name, tasted her through the syllables as if speaking it was magic in and of itself.

She slipped on the ground, feet slapping clumsily on the ground.

Another scream, and her head knocked against the floor, forehead smashing directly onto the ground, nearly crushing her nose in the scuffle. It missed the ground by a hair, but Hermione was in too much pain to feel grateful for that respite.

Her vision swam, the darkness doing nothing to settle the nausea and terror that clawed its way up her throat.

“ _Careful, darling_ — _”_

A choked whimper escaped her throat, her arms shaking when she tried to force herself back up, to stop the pounding in her head and the agony twisting around her chest. It’d been stupid to panic the way she had, but she couldn’t _think._

The darkness had robbed her of her sight, had stolen her peace of mind.

“— _can’t have you hurting yourself so soon. We’ve only just begun.”_

Then, a hand was in her hair, pulling against the strands. Claws, sharpened edges of something, wedged into her tresses and Hermione _screamed_ , and _screamed._

She kicked, arms weakly smacking behind her to get the hand to release her, to stop the pain from overtaking her, the fear from swallowing her whole.

But there was no resisting it, not when a weight suddenly pressed into her back, and a warm breath curled around the shell of her ear, seeped into her flesh until only that point felt its heat.

“G-get off!” Hermione shouted, but the presence refused.

It laughed at her, delighted by her struggling, as if she’d said something particularly amusing. It’s laughter made her stomach turn, made something strange pool within her belly that felt oddly like—

“ _You feel it don’t you?”_

Hermione stiffened, unsure of what the presence meant.

_“Now now, no need to be coy…”_

Hermione swallowed audibly, mouth suddenly dry when the presence settled more firmly above her, the shape unmistakably masculine when a hard ridge pressed against her—

“No!” She pushed back, the cry ripping from her throat when the fingers carding through her hair suddenly became unyielding, and yank her head up, then down, to smash her head into the unforgiving ground.

A sharp pain flared from the point where her face smashed into cave, and it was only after a moment of her world spinning that she noticed that the creature was laughing once again, thrilled by her struggling.

“ _Too soon, then. Such a shame…”_

The creature hummed above her, pressure easing slightly from her back. It didn’t release her altogether, but it was a small _mercy._

The fear that had overcome her seconds before eased at once. Suddenly relieved that the presence wouldn’t do what she’d feared it would; had felt it _wanted_ to do when its heat seeped through the thin layer of her clothes.

It’d been too obvious for her to ignore, but if she believed what it _said_ then perhaps it wouldn’t—.

“ _But no matter, I’ll find you again...later when you’re more agreeable,_ ” it purred into her ear, long tongue lapping at the shell before pulling its mouth away.

Hermione couldn’t stop herself from slouching forward with relief, knowing that it wouldn’t touch her any more than it already had. The fact that it would return for her in the future...she wouldn’t think about that in that moment.

“I’d rather die.”

The presence laughed again, voice melodic and soothing in spite of the danger it posed. Hermione wanted nothing more than to press her hands against her ears in that second, no longer wanting to hear, no longer willing to listen to this monster when it was making her—

“ _Death...dearest Hermione…”_ The presence hissed, amusement suddenly gone from its tone at the mention of her demise. It seemed as though she’d struck a nerve, and Hermione was at a loss of what to do. The presence went through so many emotions in the span of a second that it left her reeling.

“... _will never touch you.”_

The grip on her tightened to the point of pain, and Hermione whimpered, her hands scratching upward to get the blood grip off. It was tearing into her scalp, merciless as it pulled until her back arched painfully from the angle.

This was bloody madness.

“ _You could run to the ends of the Earth, travel across the boundless oceans in your fear…_ ”

Lips were pressed her ear once again, and a hand—the one that was not pulling against her hair with enough ferocity to tear out her hair—snaked around her neck, its light pressure more threatening than if it’d been strangling her in that moment. Brutality she understood in a sense, but this? This was _worse._

It was a gentle, soothing touch. A mockery of the caresses of a lover. It made something noxious pool low in her stomach, reminding her once again that she wanted this presence to—

_Stop it, Hermione._

_“But nothing will ever keep you from me.”_

The voice was lethal, angry and intoxicating as that hand splayed around her neck and squeezed.

It robbed her completely of air. The word suddenly shrinking to the pressure on her neck and nothing beyond that, and the strange thrill twisting along her belly.

Hermione grew lightheaded, slowly sinking into the nothing. It was draining her to the last drop, her eyes crossing from the absence of air flowing into her lungs. Quickly, her hands latched onto his, nails digging hard enough into its skin to cut, for familiar droplets of liquid to run across her fingers.

But the fingers did not relent, the hand continued to squeeze and squeeze until her body sagged, a strange buzz forming along her brain that sounded like the comforting coos of a mother reading to a child.

It sounded like her mum, like the lilt of her British accent in the silent bedroom. Hermione gave into it, lips parted and drool dribbling down her chin from her gasping breath.

She wanted to lap it all up, the familiarity of the scene manifesting before her eyes too much to resist.

“ _Yes, that’s it…”_ The voice soothed, its cooing so _beautiful_ that Hermione followed it, unable to resist when it sounded so good, when the haze suffocated her so sweetly.

“ _Give in…”_

Her mother’s voice transformed into that of a man’s, a silky croon that promised pleasures beyond her wildest dreams, that tempted her with luxurious nights twisted within his arms.

Hermione moaned, submitting to the darkness, to the sound of that voice laughing breathily into her ear.

“ _Forget the fear and the pain…”_

Hermione’s head lolled to one side, limbs numb.

She wanted to say yes, to open her mouth and let it tear the last breaths from her lungs, but her tongue had gone slack in her mouth. Useless.

“ _But remember that you belong to me…”_

Hermione’s mouth parted, stomach in knots from the comforting grip of that hand against her neck, of that voice, of that heat twisting ‘round her insides like a swarm of eels.

“Y-yes,” she moaned, eyes rolling to the back of her when her insides wrenched, and a pressure squeezed so tightly inside her belly that she couldn’t stop herself from plunging head first into that delicious haze waiting for her with outstretched arms.

The clearing. The cave. The presence. The terror. All of it melted away, lost to the sound of droplets echoing in the cavernous place. Until all that Hermione knew, all that she felt, was the heat and pleasure in that asphyxiating press of that hand around her throat.

* * *

 

The first thing she heard was the sound of rushing water.

It was familiar, and _obnoxiously loud_. It broke the haze of exhaustion that clouded her senses, pried her away from a dream she couldn’t recall, but only felt the lingering vestiges of. Strange happiness and intoxication like smoke, a sigh that breathed into her mind.

Then a finger carded through her hair like a whisper along the shell of her ear. It was ethereal, unreal. A ghost of a touch, a memory of something foreign yet _familiar_ all at once.

“ _Hermione_...”

The sound of her name was like silk, like the palms of her hands wading through clear, deadened waters. A picturesque scene, a kaleidoscope of blues and greens, of tree leaves and flowers passing through.

It wove itself around her, pulling her further into a warm embrace she had no memory of.

Fingers continued to pet her, to twist around the nape of her neck and play with the thinner strands. It was soothing, it was—

_Wrong._

Hermione shot up as if she’d been stung, suddenly more aware than she’d been for what felt like an eternity...

Her body swayed with the brash movement, vision swimming for a moment, overwhelmed by the flash of color that assaulted her vision.

She blinked rapidly to clear her sight, hoping that she was waking up in the hut of one of her patients rather than—

_Green._

She didn’t recognize her surroundings. She didn’t recognize the clearing, bright and lit with the dazzling yellow of the summer sun. None of it made sense to her...except the rapid rush of water, of droplets splattering against her chin.

_Waterfall…?_

Everything sparkled like gold, the stems of the plants, the blooms of the flowers, reds and pinks, yellows and blues. The pearly blue of cold waters, the slate grey of stone layered on top of each other like a mountain range. They were all the colors of the rainbow and more.

Brow furrowed, she wondered how she ended up here, _how_ she could have gotten here. She couldn’t have come here on her own. No, she definitely didn’t remember slipping from her sheets, and walking off into the thicket of trees several meters from her home.

Her days had been confusing at best ever since she returned weeks before from the clearing, but this simply did not make any _sense._

Something was off about the whole affair. She felt it, knew it, the strange amalgamation of fear and foreboding too difficult to ignore when she was in the middle of bloody _nowhere_ with only a large T-shirt to protect her from the caprices of nature.

 _You need to get back..._ A voice whispered, a twisted version of her own natural cadence. It was frightened...distressed.

The hairs along her arms stood on end, unable to stifle the reaction when a cold breeze brushed along her calves, curled ‘round her arms, and nestled somewhere inside her chest.

_You need to leave..._

Hermione took a step forward, but stopped immediately at the sound of something snapping from somewhere behind her.

Terror lodged itself in her throat, her limbs frozen still with its ferocity.

_You need to..._

Hermione willed herself to move, for her legs to cease their trembling—uncertain of when they had even begun _shaking_ —but they refused to obey. They were rooted in place.

_You need..._

Hermione screamed when a _real_ finger carded through her hair, and then—

A hot breath fanned along the shell of her ear. It was a whisper, a susurration that shocked her to the core; terror and...something else wedging itself low in her belly.

_You..._

Hermione’s lips parted to speak, tongue sweeping over her bottom lip nervously, throat suddenly dry.

“W-who?” She choked out, skin crawling when those fingers continued to pet her, to part through the riotous curls that she _never_ managed to tame, and tease the back of her neck. A sharp nail found the first bump of her spine, and her heart leaped up to her throat when those fingers became a wide _hand_ —

“ _Shhh_ ... _”_

Hermione could scarcely breathe, frightened out of her wits when that hand continued to take liberties with her person, to touch and knead at her flesh in ways that no _stranger_ had ever dared to before.

“ _Words have power...”_

The voice was mocking, the lilt unmistakable even through the haze of fear that blanketed over her.

“ _You know that very well, don’t you, Hermione?”_

Lips followed along the curl of her ear, and Hermione wanted to _scream._ She wanted to leap to her feet and run. She wanted to twist around and face the monstrosity that kept her imprisoned against her will—that _subdued her in ways that she did not understand._

 _God why was this happening_ — _why did it sound so bloody familiar?_

Then, as if sensing her thoughts and the suffocating fear, the weights over her limbs lifted.

Hermione sprung away, twisting around, too curious to not at least catch a glimpse of the monster that had caught her—

_That had slipped into my dreams, that had forced me from my bed, and led me here..._

But instead of the monster she had expected to see, that she was certain lurked in the shadows of the trees she’d woken up to after falling _asleep_ somehow, instead what she witnessed was a man.

_Skin radiant, the shadows from the sun casting a warm glow on pale flesh._

He was the most beautiful man she’d ever seen. As if he’d been chiseled from rock, as if the Greats from a dying era had imagined this specimen and crafted him from the very ground. She had never seen a man such as this, never imagined that one could even exist outside of a book.

It hurt to look at him, her eyes watering when she’d forgotten to blink, transfixed by the bare flesh of his shoulders, by the swell of his arms and the cut lines of his abdomen and chest.

“Not what you were expecting were you?” The man— _no, the creature_ —said.

Hermione’s mouth went dry, the familiar weight of intoxication curling low in her belly. It was the same twist, the same wrenching sensation that plagued her when she spent too long away from waterfall and its glistening greenery...

Realization struck her in that instant, and Hermione took a hasty step back, foot bumping against something she hadn’t noticed was there.

She glanced down unthinkingly, and stopped. It was her _basket_...the very same one she had lost during her last visit to the waterfall. The one she had prepared meticulously before she’d fallen asleep near the cool waters and had woken up without memory of that entire afternoon...

_Had this creature taken it? Was this monster the reason for her lapse in memory?_

“What _are_ you?” She didn’t know what to say, tongue-tied because everything about this was _wrong_ . People didn’t just make people feel this way— _like she was dying of thirst, and struggling to breathe through an ocean rather than air._ They didn’t just appear out of thin air. They didn’t just steal one’s memories, force someone to _sleep_.

Her stomach turned, and Hermione let out a pained wheeze, panicked.

The creature cocked his head to one side, rouge lips— _a mouth with sharpened teeth hidden behind the camouflage of beauty_ —twisting into a smile that made her ache to step closer. She resisted the impulse, fought it down like the wild beast that it’d become in her stomach.

_Why is this happening? Why can’t I make this stop?_

“Your _savior_ ...” he said, and Hermione took another step back, overwhelmed by the melodious sound of his voice, of a presence that grew more and more _oppressive_ the longer she remained.

“Your _god...”_ He took a step closer, and Hermione backed further away, fearful of what would happen now, of what he would _do_ if he could evoke such strange sensations in her, if he could—

_Make me want to press closer and bare my neck for his teeth to cut, for his lips to drink from me until I’m nothing more than a husk._

“Your _lord_...”

Black eyes glittered brightly with humor and...something else. Something hungry she could not name, did not understand. His gaze was boring into her, devouring her whole, watching her with careful eyes that made her feel more vulnerable than she already was.

“No, that’s _not_ what I agreed to,” she rejected, fear overshadowing the strange blossoming emotion in her belly that urged her to _go_ to him. To drop to her knees, to part her lips and take all that he had to offer, all that he had generously provided her from the moment she’d taken from the waterfall and used its seedlings to heal her patients and—

There was a name. It was on the tip of her tongue, just a hair’s length away, but it refused to come. Just who had she been about to name? Who else other than her patients had she tried to save? What was she _bloody_ missing?

“But you did, dearest Hermione,” the creature purred, edging a step closer for each step she took back, following along her pace with an elegance that her shaking limbs lacked.

“You took from me, you desecrated my forest for _humans_...” the creature’s beautiful face twisted into an ugly grimace at the word “humans,” eyes flashing a brilliant red.

Her stomach fluttered nervously, adrenaline rushing through her veins because those were the eyes of a—

“You became _mine_ the moment you continued to take from me, to sip from the waters of my riverbank...”

Hermione nearly tripped, eyes fixed on the creature’s when her foot caught on something else. A gnarled root, perhaps? She wasn’t sure, but she didn’t dare tear her eyes away from the monster. Not when his curly hair grew longer with its rage, when the inky strands now brushed against his shoulders.

He looked like a fallen angel—or what she imagined they looked like after being cast from heaven and forced to live a life of sin.

Hermione was repulsed, yet there was a thin strand of something tugging at her insides—a connection that she wanted to pry from her intestines with sharpened claws.

“That’s ridiculous!” She denied, but the creature did not reply, as if whatever words she’d said were meaningless, mere pests that he could swat away as he saw fit.

_Arse._

Hermione’s lips twisted into a snarl, but the creature’s smile only grew wider, that earlier flash of red now a more permanent fixture in his gaze.

_Like rivulets of blood that trickled from open sores..._

"I didn’t agree to this _,_ to _you_ . I came back, just as the bloody magic bid me to. There was nothing in the terms about me being _yours_.” She spat the word as if it was the most vile thing she’d ever said, incensed when the creature had the audacity to laugh at her, wading through the greenery with a patience she didn’t have. Graceful and silent, like a hunter prepared to strike once it’s prey lowered its guard.

“You should have known better than to make deals with things you did not understand... _Hermione.”_

Hermione cringed at the seductive lilt in the creature’s voice, at the way his body suddenly shifted from that of a prowling animal to a dancer. His hips moved fluidly with each step he took, powerful thighs—bare legs she’d forced herself to ignore from the moment the monster appeared—straining with each movement he made.

It was like watching a performance. Everything about the way his lips parted to take a breath, how his hair curled and brushed along his shoulders, how his pale skin glistened with sweat and his eyes sparkled with desire, a ploy to conquer.

She refused to be baited, to fall into the pitfalls of his ruse. The connection between them, the contract that she’d unwittingly signed, was more than enough for her to deal with.

Hermione had more than enough issues as it was.

“...So naive, expecting that I could be satisfied with only your presence, that you did not give up more of yourself with each visit—”

 _No_ , she hadn’t. She didn’t.

 _But what if you did_ ? A voice whispered, weak and brittle. A shadow of her own voice. _You do not remember losing the basket...you do not remember the afternoon passing when you awoke splayed on the ground._ Hermione wanted to silence the voice, to cover her ears and _stop bloody listening_.

The voice didn’t listen to her plight. It was merciless.

 _You don’t know anything...you don’t know what you sacrificed_ . The voice laughed, the sound bitter and sardonic to her ears. _You’ve let yourself forget._

_Now now, no need to be coy..._

“Stop,” she demanded, unsure of who she was even speaking to when the creature crept closer, when that voice beat against her brain, dragging forth memories she _knew_ she didn’t want to recall.

_But is ignorance really bliss, Hermione? Will leaving this stone unturned protect you from the consequences of your past?_

She cursed under her breath when her foot dipped into a pothole she had missed in her distraction, and nearly fell backwards. She caught herself before she did, vaulting to keep herself balanced, but she hadn’t moved quickly enough. It was too _late_ to continue the game of cat and mouse she had unwittingly begun.

In her moment of distraction—in the _second_ her eyes flickered away from his form to her ankle—he was on her.

She screamed when his hands caught her wrists, a vicious heat simmering wherever his fingers touched her bare skin.

She kicked, but he wrestled her back, manipulated her with an ease that made her stomach roil with nerves and excitement. Her hatred for this connection, for what it had done to her and how it made her feel, sweltered. It ate at her, drowned out the cries of reason that urged her to plan—to stop moving and catch him completely off guard.

All she knew was chaos.

“L-let go of me!” She shouted, but the creature did not listen to her. No, he never did and never would. He _wanted_ , the voracious creature wanted what he couldn’t have. A human girl with a mind he’d never seen before, with a selfless spirit that he simply wasn’t able to make sense of. She could sense his intentions, could hear words whispered into her mind that told her this was so.

Hermione didn’t know how she knew these things. She didn’t _want_ to know—she didn’t want to listen anymore, to feel these things that were driving her mad.

The connection broke her apart, speared her with knowledge she shouldn’t have. She knew more in the second their flesh met than she knew about herself, than she knew about the clearing she stumbled upon clumsily.

The creature knew envy, gluttony, pride, sloth, wrath, greed, and lust. He danced along the back of her mind, his voice and her own blurred into one.

The monster didn’t understand _her_ , she realized right then when he shoved her into a tree, wood biting against her spine, shredding holes into the fabric. Her shirt tore like a hot blade to butter, the thin and overwashed material giving easily; no match for the monster’s violence.

“...You feel it this time, don’t you?” The creature purred, leaning forward until his hot breath fanned across her face. It smelled of lavender and earth, salt and something other dancing along the scent.

Hermione didn’t know what to make of that.

“You can hear my voice, you can taste my emotions on your tongue…”

She whimpered when his nails cut into her wrists, sharp pain and a dull ache forming along the flesh when she tried to twist away, but couldn’t. The creature’s grip was unyielding, the possessive note thrumming along the back of her mind alerting her of this fact.

“You crave this... _need_ me,” he purred, dark eyes glowing unnaturally despite the hot sun assaulting them both.

With unsteady legs, Hermione forced herself to press her bare feet against his calves, convinced now that if she allowed the monster to touch more of her, if she dared give in for a single moment that it would—

_Awaken that creature inside me that begged to be devoured, that demanded that this creature bury himself deeply inside me and never let me go._

It was in that moment of resistance that one of the creature’s legs slipped between her parted thighs, the shirt riding up until her knickers were fully exposed to the breeze cutting between the trees.

“Don’t you, _Hermione?_ ” He purred, and Hermione’s back arched, a strangled gasp escaping her lips when a knee pressed against her cunt, and smoothed the naked flesh against her underwear. It wasn’t direct contact, but that _heat._

It cut through her knickers, penetrated the fabric more readily than the rough bark of the tree against her back. It possessed her, thrilled her.

It was intoxicating and Hermione _hated_ it.

“N-never,” she gasped, a low moan caught in her throat when the creature leaned in, when his lips smoothed against her cheek, lighting that flesh aflame. It was as though he’d pressed a lit match to the skin.

“ _Liar_ …” he hissed, and then, Hermione felt something snake around her waist, the texture coarse and thick as it wound itself around her arms to force her back against the tree. She had half the mind to glance back, to turn a confused look behind her and—

They were vines. They pulled against her, ensnared her like a butterfly caught in the maw of a Venus flytrap. She pulled against it, testing the strength of the vines. They didn’t budge. She was bound to the tree, her shaking legs the only part of her that remained free.

Fear flared to life, and Hermione began to kick, unafraid of falling now that she was certain the vines would keep her perfectly in place.

“Y-you can’t do this,” she said through gritted teeth, but the creature ignored her, pressing close until only the thin layer of her T-shirt protected her against him. Not that it was much help, not that it did _anything_ to keep her from losing her bloody mind.

There was no escaping this, no running from the need that pulsed inside her at the lightest touch of warm lips against her face, of a tongue that smoothed further down her face to taste her flesh.

“Oh, but I can,” he murmured into her cheek, his hands releasing their bruising grip on her wrists to trail down her forearms, her elbows, and lower still until his hands caught along the sleeves of her shirt.

“I can do anything to you.”

His hands clasped onto the sleeves and yanked, tearing the fabric down the middle with a seemingly easy twist of its wrists. She flinched away from the sound, skin stinging where the shirt tore along her skin.

“I can make things move without touching them—” he said, emphasizing his point by lifting her legs from the ground, stilling her furious bucking at once.

Hermione had never been more thrilled and terrified than in that moment.

“And I can make people _hurt_ if I wish them to—”

The sudden absence of the creature’s playfulness was the only warning she had before fingers wound themselves around her throat, sharp nails biting into her neck until red crescent marks wept bloody tears.

Hermione screamed, the creature’s touch suddenly unbearable. The pleasure dissipated at once. The comforting heat, the pleasurable thrum of that connection between them, severed. It left her _empty._

Squirming and writhing, her legs shook uselessly with the strain. She was blinded, drowning. It was madness. This emptiness, this agony too much for even her stubborn nature to bear.

_God, please make this stop._

“Do you want this to stop?” The creature’s mocking voice cut through the haze of agony, and Hermione twisted her head to shoot the monster the most disgusted look she could muster. She would rather _die_ . She would rather suffer through this curse endlessly than _beg_ for her life.

She knew what he wanted. She’d been in his head, lapped at the crumbs he left for her to devour unknowingly…

Hermione _refused_ to yield.

“Fuck you,” she spat, teeth bared threateningly at the monster. “I’d sooner _die_ , I’d sooner be mauled by a wild animal than beg you for mercy.”

The creature froze, the sudden raising of his brows the only sign that he was surprised. Hermione ignored it, continuing to speak even as her skin felt as if it was being flayed from her bones.

“Hurt me, but I will _never_ give in.”

There was a brief pause. A moment when neither one of them spoke, the agony suddenly lifting as if it had never been.

And then—

Pleasure sang in her blood. A suffocating, nauseating ecstasy that wound itself around her throat, that pulsed in time with the rapid beating of her heart.

She choked on it, fingers clenching into tight fists to stop herself from losing herself to the current. It was insanity, suffocating. It assaulted her, blinded her, robbed her completely of thought.

“ _No_ ,” she moaned, anguish and delight twisting inside her. The warring emotions, the conflicting needs within her, tearing her up at the seams.

She fought against it, pushed against the force, against _his will_ wedging itself into the nodges of her spine, but there was no resisting. The connection was stronger than her, buried too deeply inside for her to ward off as easily as the pain.

_God…_

The creature was expressionless, gazing into her eyes as if he were attempting to divine her secrets, to understand the sort of human that she was. His fingers hung loosely around her throat, blunt nails still digging into the skin.

“ _S-stop it._ ”

The pleasure didn’t stop. It only increased, twisting and bending her will until she could no longer speak, until not even her pleas made sense to her own ears. It was too much, it was _too much_ —

The creature leaned in once again, fingers releasing his grip on her throat to caress the tender skin, smearing her blood along her mocha skin to create shapes she could not see for herself. The touch made her burn, silenced her mind until only his touch, only the dull ache pulsing between her thighs, was all she could focus on.

Those fingers trailed lower, slipped between her naked breasts to splay along her stomach, lighting her abdomen aflame with renewed need. She was like a livewire—a conduit for a power that she never imagined could be real, never thought could shape her into a creature that knew nothing but _lust_ —

_A monstrous beast that wanted to be free from the vines trapping her against the tree, that wanted to drink her fill of the man before her and bind them until they were no longer two, but only one._

She writhed against his knee, chased after the friction that made her blood cry with euphoria. It felt so _good_ , and so fucking wrong.

“How curious... _”_ the creature mused, the hand smoothing lower as fingers caressed her hip bone, making her mind melt from the contact.

_God please._

“Humans normally weep when in pain, but _you…_ ” he breathed, a curious note to his voice when his fingers fell lower, teasing along the seam of her knickers.

Hermione’s breath caught, a choked moan escaping her mouth at the brief touch. The promise of more was almost too much, the knee against her cunt, the fingers against her flesh no longer  enough.

“Pleasure makes you malleable, like earth ready to bend to the will of its _master_ —” he groaned, eyes flashing brightly when her back arched, as if offering herself to the creature. Begging, asking almost silently, for more.

_God, I need more._

“Do you want me to touch you, little human?” he said when his face pressed closer, lips brushing against her own, drinking in the desperate wheezes rushing past her lungs.

Hermione licked at them, the scent of lavender and nature, of dark promises and _completion_ , just inches from her lips.

The hand refused to lower, refused to give her the friction she was aching for. The knee was not enough. Never enough. She need his fingers, she needed his palms, direct contact with his flesh.

She’d go mad without it, she’d go mad _with_ it. It made no difference.

“ _Please,_ ” the plea left her lips easily.

There was a moment where he did nothing. The air stilled, and the swaying of the trees around them fell into a hush. It was a split second, an infinity trapped within an eternity.

Then, hot lips smashed into her own, a hot tongue smoothed along the seam of her mouth, and teased the bottom of her quivering lip. Hermione gasped, shock and madness pulsing through her veins when teeth tore into the flesh, the taste of iron thick on her tongue.

It should have disgusted her, should have stopped her from wanting this, from wanting this otherworldly creature that could bend her will to suit his needs, but it didn’t. The pain made her feel _alive_ , the taste of blood and the throaty growl vibrating along the monster’s throat only made her cunt clench with desire.

Fingers suddenly grabbed onto her knickers, nails digging into the cotton, before it was soon torn from her flesh, baring her to his eyes, to the breeze that twisted through the surrounding trees.

She shuddered, streams of her desire dribbling from her cunt when that knee pulled back and then thick fingers found her flesh. His thumb brushed against her clitoris in that instance, the wet _schlick_ of her wetness loud to her own ears when the monster pulled back from her mouth, lips bright red with her blood.

“I should leave you hungry for my flesh…” He said, suddenly dropping to his knees. Hermione’s legs quivered, straining when his hand wound around her left thigh and slung it over his shoulder. It was unmistakable what he planned to do.

“I should refuse you, for daring to resist my spell...for daring to fight the power that binds us both…” He moaned, red eyes gazing intently into her own. His breath brushed against her cunt, the promise of that moist and hot heat almost enough to make her come in that instant.

“I-I,” she wanted to urge him not to, but she caught herself. She shouldn’t. She _shouldn’t_ even think to. This was wrong, it was beyond depraved. This desire, this hunger, it was all the creature’s doing. It was artificial. It wasn’t _real_.

But she _wanted. God_ , did she want it. It was eating her alive, it was the most delicious torture she’d ever experienced.

Frustrated, angry tears gathered at the corners of her eyes. But she kept them back, refused to let them fall. She wasn’t weak. She _wasn’t_ —

 _But you want him don’t you?_ That voice said again. The same damning whisper that tempted her with things she shouldn’t want, shouldn’t _need_. She didn’t want this.

_Yes, you do. You recognize this, recognize what this means._

Laughter twisted insider her, and Hermione laughed too, the sound caught between madness and desperation.

_I’m losing my bloody mind..._

“I can leave you aching here...do not doubt that I would, that I would not let the fires inside eat away at you until you’re nothing but a monstrous creature no better than _myself_ ,” he laughed, voice cutting like glass.

Hermione’s restraint, pride and control splintered, cracked along the middle like frail porcelain.

“Don’t, please,” she groaned, shifting her hips forward, chasing after the sweet allure of his mouth when his lips brushed against her cunt, when they were so _close_ she could almost feel them along her folds, pressed against her drenched cunt.

The creature cocked his head to the side, assessing her, scrutinizing her. An eternity seemed to pass, and Hermione’s twisting grew wilder the longer the connection thrummed between them  without any sign of it abating.

She was just about to beg when a hand pressed against her cunt, parting her for his inspection. Hermione let out a choked cry, nerves coming to life when his mouth was suddenly on her. A tongue swept along her clitoris, the thumb that’d trailed over it earlier dropping to curl past her aching cunt and further back.

She felt it along her arse, along the wrinkled skin of her arsehole, a threat she couldn’t help but be excited for as his mouth devoured her. He circled around her arsehole, all the while his tongue worked her with no sign of abating, flicking and sucking her clit until all that slipped past her throat were excited cries.

Ecstasy swept her away, drowned out any reservations that lingered in the back of her head. How could she? When it was insurmountable, when those lips fit around her cunt like no other had before?

She ached for this man, more than was humanly possible.

Hermione had never been more desperate to run her fingers through his hair, to rake her nails against his scalp and draw blood. She wanted to force his head further against her, to feel his teeth bite into her skin until she, too, bled as he did.

A sharp bite twisted inside her, his teeth catching on her clit to nip at the nub. She thought she might die, in that second. Screaming, unable to do nothing else but undulate against him as he devoured her as if she were the best meal he’d had in _ages._

“ _M-more._ ”

She wanted him to consume her, to burn her from the inside out until there nothing was left. The dark want inside her writhed and twisted, beating against the cage she’d wrestled it into, but Hermione’s control was slipping. Her grip on the prison was slackening, her sanity crumbling when that tongue flickered lower to lap at her fluids, to taste more of her wetness.

His fingers tightened to the point of pain, the promise of bruising sealed. The hand along her arse caressed the crack, teased the wrinkled flesh as if curious to know what she’d do if it did something like—

A finger pushed inside her arse, and she jolted, the burn heightening rather than detracting from the high of his mouth against her. Of the hand that slipped away from her cunt and teased along her pussy, prodding at her entrance, eyes still glued to her own as he tasted her.

The finger in her arse pulled back, but then that finger was burying back inside, setting a rhythm she couldn’t keep up with. His mouth did not stop, his tongue did not cease the wet slither along her clit, tonguing her until a deep pressure swelled low in her belly.

She was so close she could taste completion on the back of her tongue, her hips jerking and twisting in time with the pass of his tongue along her cunt, the tantalizing push of his fingers in her arse making her almost—

Hermione screamed with frustration when the creature pulled away. When the delicious heat of his mouth, and the finger twisting inside her, was replaced by cold air.

She never wanted to kill this creature more than in that moment.

“NO!”

Hermione saw red, vision blurring at the edges when the creature had the audacity to laugh at her before he rose, powerful thighs straining with the motion. Her attention suddenly landing on flesh she’d spent the whole afternoon trying to avoid, willfully skirting away from the cock between his legs.

The head was flushed, a white pearly substance oozing from its slit. Hermione flushed, terrified and excited at its girth. It was thicker than his fingers, thicker than any man she’d ever slept with.

It was so distracting that when his fingers rested on her cunt and _curled_ , questing and curious, to tease her swollen nub, a jolt shot up her spine.

Hermione moaned and threw her head back, hips rolling against his thumb. She urged him to slide it further along her cunt, to coax an index finger to push _inside_ —

But he didn’t. He brushed against her hole, driving her near insanity with the teasing touch.

Hermione clenched her hands into fists, teeth catching along her bottom lip to gnaw at the flesh. It stung, lip bitten raw after the monster had devoured her with his kiss earlier.

She couldn’t be damned to care about that I’m that instance. All that mattered were those fingers, and that it wasn’t _enough._ Everything about this was agonizing. It was too slow. Too light. _Soft_.

A reminder of how close she’d been to reaching her own completion before he’d denied her—cut off the delicious friction of his tongue on her clit. She _hated_ him for it. For everything he did to her.

After he’d made her _beg_ for it.

Hermione wanted to scream, so hungry for more.

“You _bastard_ ,” she hissed, tossing the monster a glower when he laughed at her, lips smoothing into a predatory curl. It was teasing, playful with the way it made his handsome features less fearsome. But there was something wicked in that gaze.

A darkness lurking, a promise of pain and debauchery.

Hermione hated the way it made her insides flutter like the wings of a hummingbird, hoping that he’d slip that finger inside her, that he’d break her open on his fingers so that she could _finally_ —

“You’re not wrong,” he replied, amusement obvious with the way his lip twitched with suppressed laughter.

Hermione hissed, eyes fluttering closed for a moment when his thumb pushed against her clit hard enough to hurt, the sharp twinge of agony making the visceral pleasure worse.

“Though I much prefer if you were screaming my name.”

Hermione released a shuddering breath and shot him a dark smile before replying, “You’ve never given me one. You’re just a monster like any other—“

She didn’t get to finish her sentence.

A sharp cry burst from her throat when two fingers were suddenly inside her cunt, missing her g-spot by a hair. It had to be on purpose, she thought dimly as she rolled her hips into those fingers.

Pushing, urging him to touch more of her, to quench that thirst pulsing in time with the heat of her heart.

“Lord Voldemort,” he said through grit teeth, something wild flashing in his gaze that made Hermione immediately think of an angry serpent.

It took her an embarrassingly long time to realize that was his name, caught in the delicious slide of his fingers in her cunt and that thumb rubbing her clit _raw._

 _“_ Remember it. You will be screaming it momentarily.”

Hermione’s lip curled, her desperation making her bold, her desire and hunger for his touch driving her to the brink.

“Doubtful,” she moaned, pressing into his fingers as much as the vines permitted, “You want to play with your food, you want me so desperate for you that you’ll spend all night here without taking your own pleasure.”

His fingers didn’t stop, but neither did her mouth. Her sanity had long since fled, all that mattered was that haze curling in the back of her head and her desperate need to come.

“You’re hard, just aching to fuck me against this tree. Why don’t you? What’s _stopping_ you?” She whined, uncaring that she sounded more breathless than she liked. That she was practically tempting this monster to finish what he’d begun.

At this point, none of that mattered. _None._

“Oh sweetheart, are you trying to seduce me?” Voldemort said, leaning forward until their lips brushed once again, eyes gazing intently into her own.

They were like bright suns, the black of his pupil slowly eating the red.

“S-succeeding—” she tried to finish, but couldn’t, mouth falling slack when those fingers curled, nudging at her g-spot.

The shock swept her away like a rip current, strangling whatever taunt she could think of to get the bastard to move.

_God, this feels so good._

“Beg me to fuck you,” Voldemort said, eyes fixed on her flushed face as he fucked her on his fingers. Curling, twisting, thumb pulling away from her clit to force his palm forcefully against the nub.

Hermione’s mouth flew open, but no words came. Something held her back, something that sounded an awful lot like _reason_ , like the concerned voice of a friend she should remember but couldn’t.

“Tell me you want _me_ , that you _need_ me,” he murmured into her lips, tongue flicking out to taste the blood still running down her thin.

She felt a hand curl around her leg once again and mount it on his hip, bending the knee until he fit easily between her parted thighs.

“I can _smell_ your desire, little human…” he groaned, working her so hard on his fingers that it nearly hurt. It was _too_ much, and yet—

Hermione wanted more, so much more.

She bent her knee to drag him closer, but he did not budge. He was stone. No more than a statute as he watched her with a only a devious curl on his lips.

An impatient whimper escaped her throat, but still, he only touched her, pulling her closer to climax before receding back. A constant push and pull, a denial of release that made her want to bite into his throat in her frustration.

 _Don’t do this…_ A voice pled.

Hermione ignored it.

“P-please _fuck_ me—,” she keened, hips trembling with her exertions when his palm pulled away once more, when his fingers stopped their assault right when she was about to come.

It was pathetic. Made more humiliating by the fact that she shouldn’t want this, but she was _burning_.

“—I don’t care if you _kill_ me after this, if you press your fingers against my neck and suffocate me, j-just,” a frustrated cry burst from her throat when the palm returned, and still, the monster made no move to do as she asked.

“ _Lord Voldemort, please fuck me_.”

She had barely finished the phrase before it all devolved into _madness_. His lips curled into a mad grin, sharp teeth she’d never seen before flashing along the white, before his fingers were torn from her cunt.

Choking from the surprise, Hermione missed the second the vines unwound themselves from her body, and her body began to fall. Her arms shot up, but before she could drop onto her knees, a deceptively strong arm twined around her waist and stopped her.

“What are you do—”

She was wrenched away from the tree, the world spinning furiously when he bent and swooped her off her feet to carry her off.

None of it registered to her, could have made sense to her. She’d been certain he’d fuck her against that tree, that when his eyes flashed at her that he’d put her out of her misery.

Stoke the flame and end the lust that curled treacherously in her cunt.

She struggled within his arms, smacking along his shoulders, nails cutting along his arms leaving red welts in their path.

Fury overcame her, hunger and primal desire making her more animal than human in that instant.

_How dare he?_

Then, he was shoving her onto a hard, wet surface. The grooves of something cutting along her spine, uncomfortable and painful, but not nearly enough to dissipate the haze of lust that’d overcome her.

A hand grabbed brutally at her leg, and Hermione kicked, infuriated at the smug expression on his face, at the satisfaction derived at her expense. She wanted him to hurt, she wanted him to _fuck her bloody now._

Something wet and hard brushed against her slit, and she smacked her head back into the ground, wild curls fanning around her when he leaned down to press their foreheads together.

“ _Mine.”_

Hermione had a second to look down, to catch where his body aligned with hers, to note that the smooth hardness pressed against her slit was his _cock_ before—

Voldemort slid inside her, splitting her open on his girth.

Pain shot up her spine, pleasure chasing after the sharp sting when he didn’t wait for her to adjust, when his mouth slid down her cheek to laugh into her ear.

It was a dark and insidious sound.

“ _Yesss…_ ” he hissed into her ear, the sharp hitch of his breath against the shell of her ear lost to her. Nothing else mattered but where their bodies connected, where his cock burrowed deeply inside to pull right back out.

It left her speechless, left her mad with rapture to feel each groove of his cock, to feel the moment his cock bumped against her g-spot.

Tears gathered at the corners of her eyes, mouth falling open into a wide “o” when his teeth caught her ear and he bit into the flesh hard enough to draw blood.

She didn’t know what to do, where to _touch._ Her hands clasped onto his shoulders, nails digging into them desperately to find some semblance of balance— _of control where there wasn’t any._

He ate at her flesh and sucked along her earlobe until all she knew was that mouth. Distracting her enough that when his hand smoothed along her leg to wind it around his hips, sharp nails dragging along her flesh to leave painful welts, all Hermione could do was release a desperate cry.

The cuts beaded with blood, her knee jolting but otherwise remaining glued to his hip, pulling him with all the force she possessed deeper inside her.

 _“_ O-oh _god_.”

Her eyes rolled to the back of her head when that same hand trailed a burning path between her shaking legs, thumb finding the hood of her clit and stroking it teasingly.

A pleased purr rumbled from his chest at the sound.

“Your _god_ cannot save you now…” he said between nips, a second hand now trailing up her stomach, nails scratching along her ribcage.

“Your heart,” he said, hands stopping at the center  of her chest in emphasis, “is _mine.”_

Hermione didn’t deny it. She couldn’t even had she wanted to, swept away by the shocks of his cock smashing into her cunt and his thumb on her clit.

“Your mind, little healer,” he groaned, tongue gliding along her carotid artery affectionately, “is _mine_.”

Hermione arched her back and threw her head back, legs quivering when her orgasm was so close she could _taste it_ , when that pressure began to built without any sign of dying out. She could have cried with joy, utterly thrilled. The promise of what’d been denied to her one too many times already, euphoric.

So much so that she didn’t care when teeth suddenly dug into her neck, blunt pain searing through her when he didn’t stop, grinding on the flesh like a voracious animal. He devoured her, rivulets of her own blood trickling down to her collarbones.

“You _soul_ —” he moaned after pulling his mouth away from her neck, chin drenched in blood and her fluids from when he’d fucked her on his mouth. Hermione followed the bloody trail, her half-lidded eyes taking her fill of the monstrosity as he slid wetly inside her, moved without any hitch in his breath. As if he weren’t as affected as she, as if he, somehow, wasn’t falling apart each time he fucked into her tight cunt.

Hermione clenched around him, wanting to _crush_ him, to trap him inside her, and she nearly laughed, mad with the high of this lust, when his nostrils flared.

“—is mine,” a fingers flicked over her nipple, and Hermione tore her gaze away from his crimson eyes. He twisted them, rolled the nub until they _ached_.

“ _Fuck_ ,” she hissed when he leaned down to capture that same nipple into his mouth. Her teeth gnashed at the sensation, the hot and moist heat of his tongue flicking across the sensitive peak along with the twin pleasure of his cock in her cunt and his thumb working her clit, unbearable.

Voldemort did not speak, simply hummed into her skin before lowering the hand on her breast back down the burning path from which it came, nails cutting along her stomach, to wrap around her shaking thigh. He hiked her hips higher, her arse now completely off the ground as he forced her legs apart to take more of his cock.

He was pushing inside, thrusts coming more deeply than the last. She hardly noticed when a finger, once more, prodded at her arse.

“ _All_ of you, even the child that I will sire in your womb, belongs to _me_ —”

His words jarred her. Surprise nearly overcoming the powerful magic twisting her insides into a wanton mess.

_Child?_

There was a split second where the pleasure cut along her senses, threatening to drown her once more, and then an ear splitting laugh tumbled from her lips. Humor, dark delight twisted along her insides. Foreign, yet familiar to her as it consumed her—burrowed within concave of her chest.

“C-child?” Hermione groaned, positioning her hips so that she could take more of him. So that she didn’t miss each wet drag of his thumb circling her nub, torturing it with his quick flicks. She wanted _all_ of it.

Voldemort hesitated for a moment, motions slowing as if to allow her to speak her mind. Curious as to why she was laughing, why she was no longer moaning for him to continue fucking her with wild abandon, finger threatening to slide inside her arse at any possible second.

Hermione didn’t care.

This was too good. Too delightful. She couldn’t stop herself even if she’d wanted to.

“I’m _infertile_ ,” she whispered conspiratorially, cunt clenching around his cock like a vice, delighted when he lifted his head, eyes widening fractionally in shock before something cold and cruel, a fury she’d never seen before in his gaze, overtook him.

Three wet fingers, possibly the same ones that he’d shoved in her cunt earlier, forced their way inside her arse.

“— _ah!”_

Hermione saw white.

She came hard, fluid gushing from between her thighs. She splattered over her own stomach, over his, his hands making wet, sloppy sounds as he continued to fuck her through her orgasm. To stroke her clit, thumb and forefinger suddenly pinching over the oversenstive nub to tear a screech from her throat.

It was too much. _God_ , it was too _much_.

She beat against his shoulders, twisted and fought against his body when he didn’t stop fucking her, when his cock kept bumping into her g-spot with a fury she couldn’t keep up with. His hips were merciless, the fingers in her arse fucking her in perfect synchrony to his own thrusts.

“ _Stop_ —ah!”

Hermione cried, another orgasm foisted upon her immediately after the first. Her hips stuttered, locking in place at the sudden shift from ecstasy to _pain_. An unquantifiable, blood boiling pain that made hot tears dribble down her cheeks, her mouth slack with her screams—

“Oh, _Hermione_ ,” the _monster_ hissed, tone bereft of all amusement. There was only danger, only pleasure beyond what she could stand, in his tone. It was thrilling, _bloody insane_.

Everything about this, everything about _them_ , was senseless.  

“My cruel little healer, how fortunate that _I_ have no need for a child—”

His thrusts became more sporadic, wilder. His fingers in her arse curled, cruel with the way they stroked her insides, with the way his knuckle smacked into her arse, his thumb and forefinger rotated between pinching, stroking, and petting her clit.

“Not when I have you.”

Hermione screamed when her third orgasm came, when his mouth crashed against hers to feast on her screams, tongue forcing its way inside and stroking her own. She tasted blood, tasted her cunt, tasted everything that he’d done to her and more. It was _wrong_ , so wrong, so fucking—

Then, his hips stuttered to a stop, a loud groan slipping from his lips when he pulled back from her mouth. Warmth flooded her, filled her to the brim, his own orgasm coming seconds after her own.

Her arms dropped like weights, knuckles smashing into the rock below, but the twinge of pain insufficient to cut through the wave of lethargy that consumed her. She couldn’t move, couldn’t think. She didn’t even have the energy to protest when his fingers pulled out of her arse and his thumb ceased stroking her.

She was mush.

This all went on for what felt like an eternity. The heat, the cold grit of the rock beneath her back, and the cool breath of the waterfall, and the lethargy weighing her limbs, all that she could make sense of.

Until that too began to slowly recede, her cognizance finally returning to her after drowning in artificial lust. Everything flooded back to her like a punch to the gut, and she wanted to be _sick_.

_No._

Voldemort did not move, his softening cock still buried inside her despite the horrifying realization that consumed her. As if he _belonged_ there, had a right to her that no one else had.

_No._

His eyes were glowing, cheeks flushed from his exertions. He was positively radiant, skin coated with a sheen of sweat that made him almost look _human._

Terror cut through the post-coital haze when he leaned down, eyes slanted with delight. As if what he saw in her, what he read from her gaze, pleased him immensely.

A hand rose, and she flinched, forcing herself as much as the rock at her back could allow. Voldemort did not seemed perturbed by her show of fear, by the repulsed sneer that twisted her expression when his hand slid along her cheek, a curious note in his gaze.

“I’ve never seen a creature more beautiful,” he said, drinking her in, her own wide eyes reflected within his gaze. “More cruel than _you._ ”

Hermione wanted to deny it, but there was something lodged in her throat. Something like a scream of terror that wanted to escape, so she held back. Chose instead to stay silent because memories, terrible memories began to flicker behind her mind’s eye.

_Now now, no need to be coy…_

Her head exploded with pain, an agony that split her down the middle. It was his voice, his _words_ , echoing in her brain.

_Too soon, then. Such a shame…_

Hermione pressed her hands against her ears, weakened as she was, eyes no longer looking at _him._

_But no matter, I’ll find you again...later when you’re more agreeable._

She wanted it to stop. She wanted it all to stop, but Voldemort suffocated her. His body was still pressed against her, his cock still _inside_ her hardening once more as if her show of terror aroused him.

_Death...dearest Hermione…_

Hermione’s breath hitched, a sob twisting around her windpipe. Recalling, right then, that this wasn’t the first time. That it _hadn’t_ been.

... _will never touch you._

She wanted to carve her chest open and tear out her beating heart. She wanted to force it down his smiling lips, if that meant ending this agony. If it meant that he wouldn’t follow her.

_You could run to the ends of the Earth, travel across the boundless oceans in your fear…_

Voldemort leaned forward, thumb brushing along her cheek bone. Only realizing in that moment when the monster cooed, when his finger came away wet, that she was crying.

 _“But nothing will ever keep you from me,”_ Voldemort said, repeating the words that reverberated like dying breaths in an empty church. As if he could hear her thoughts, as if he could taste her _pain._

“For I am far crueler than _you_.”


End file.
